Vanity Fair

Jeweled color, bright night
Buying, yelling, laughing, dying
This is where we sell contentment
Happiness and love and lying.
Living stupefied and numb
To danger. Grasping, twisting, crying
Locked together, held by fear
And desperate to drag the
Pilgrim into all the whirling
Color, down into the pit and
Hold him, silent and secure.

Yet he fights the hollow voices
Holds his ears, continues walking
'Til his steps are stopped by ropes
And all is clamor, Screeching, squawking
Judging, hating, hurting, beating
Then he hangs and whimpers. Mocking
Fills his ears and pain fills up
The empty spaces. Suddenly a
Flashing light that drowns and smothers,
All the colors.
Pilgrim falls.
But Faithful rises.
Safe and sheltered, after all.